Statistics

Measuring Well-Being and Progress - Events

Upcoming events

In recent years, wealth inequality has become the subject of increasing debate among policy-makers, the media, and the general public. It has been argued that high wealth inequality, through the generation of capital income, has the potential to deepen income inequality, and in turn, harm economic growth in the long term. However, the issues associated with the distribution of wealth go well beyond the purely economic dimension, with high wealth inequality also being linked to negative impacts on social cohesion, high economic vulnerability, unequal political capital, and limited social mobility and equality of opportunity. Researchers, policy-makers and stakeholders from across the OECD will come together at this conference to discuss the latest evidence on the nature of inequalities in the distribution of household wealth, their implications for society and the challenges for policy-makers that they raise. Those interested in attending can register by writing to: wellbeing@oecd.org.

OECD World Forums on “Statistics, Knowledge and Policy”

For over a decade, the OECD World Forums on "Statistics, Knowledge and Policy" have been pushing forward the boundaries of well-being measurement and policy. By bringing together thousands of leaders, experts and practitioners from around the world, and from all sectors of society, the Fora have helped to shape the ongoing paradigm shift to emphasise people’s well-being as the ultimate focus for policies and collective action.

The 6th OECD World Forum will showcase international best practices and innovations to improve quality of life and sustainable well-being for all. It will take a forward-looking perspective, focussing on issues such as digitalisation, trust, the role of government and business in improving well-being, among many other topics. More information, including the preliminary agenda, will be available in early 2018.

Regional conferences

Several regional conferences were organised in the lead up to the 4th OECD World Forum. These events were jointly convened with National Statistical Offices and leading national and regional actors, in collaboration with the OECD Development Centre and the PARIS21 Secretariat. The aim was to deepen on-going reflection on how to measure well-being and the progress of societies, enhance the relevance of measures and analysis for addressing key policy issues, and lead to concrete outputs, such as establishing frameworks for future work.

>> 26-28 Jun. 2012

European Conference on Measuring Well-Being and Fostering the Progress of Societies, OECD Headquarters, Paris, France The Conference represented the first milestone for the co-ordination activities undertaken as part of the European Framework for Measuring Progress e-Frame EU FP7 project. The conference served as a platform for discussing how best to advance the implementation of the recommendations included in the Final Report of the European Statistical System (ESS) Sponsorship Group on Measuring Progress, Well-Being and Sustainable Development, adopted by the ESS Committee in November 2011.

Past events

This Workshop discussed the foundations to measuring business’ impacts on well-being through the creation of new measurement standards in close collaboration with the business sector, and as part of existing reporting practices that already transcend economic performance.

Understanding how people experience and feel about their lives provides valuable information for policy-makers. But for public policy to improve people’s subjective well-being, we need a good understanding of what drives it. This two-day conference examined the latest evidence from the UK and international research on the determinants of subjective well-being over the life course, and what this might mean for policy-making.

The International Panel on Social Progress (IPSP) is uniting the world’s leading researchers, sociologists, and economists in a single effort: Developing research-based, multi-disciplinary, non-partisan, action-driven solutions to the most pressing challenges of our time. The IPSP is harnessing the competence of hundreds of experts on social issues to deliver a report addressed to all social actors, movements, organisations, politicians and decision-makers, in order to provide them with the best expertise on questions that bear on social change. This Seminar brought a number of IPSP authors to the OECD to discuss the first draft of the report Rethinking Society for the 21st Century.

The OECD and PARIS21 hosted the 2nd Meeting of the Praia Group on Governance Statistics organised by the National Institute of Statistics of Cabo Verde (INECV). The objective of this meeting was to bring the members together in order to develop the Roadmap for their work to be presented at the 49th Session of the United Nations Statistics Commission. It was also an opportunity for the members to further discuss their engagement for the Strategic Development Goals.

This initiative is an ambitious attempt to integrate the measurement of well-being "beyond GDP" into the definition and evaluation of public policies. What preliminary conclusions can we drawn from this initiative? How does it affect the Government’s policy agenda? How does it influence, or could potentially influence, public policy evaluation practices? To what extent can this initiative strengthen the capacity to coordinate actions between the different administrations and political actors? These issues were discussed during the seminar jointly organised by the French Delegation to the OECD and the OECD Statistics Directorate. It also offered the opportunity to compare the French experience with that of other OECD countries that have taken, or are considering taking, a similar approach, as well as to take stock of the OECD’s latest thoughts on how well-being could inform policy making, notably in the context of the New Approaches to Economic Challenges (NAEC) and Inclusive Growth projects. The French version of the OECD’s latest report on well-being, How's Life? 2015 Measuring Well-Being, was launched on this occasion.

The High-Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress (HLEG) held a thematic workshop on Economic Insecurity: Forging an Agenda for Measurement and Analysis. This event, hosted by the Washington Center for Equitable Growth, the Yale Institution for Social and Policy Studies, and the Ford Foundation, brought together experts in the field to take stock of the best thinking and practice regarding the measurement and analysis of economic insecurity.

The High-Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress (HLEG) held a thematic workshop on Measuring Economic, Social and Environmental Resilience. This event, sponsored by the SAS Institute and supported by the Einaudi Institute for Economic and Finance, the Italian National Institute of Statistics and the Bank of Italy, brought together experts in the field of measuring the different dimensions of resilience to discuss the most recent developments and possible future developments.

The OECD organised a workshop on subjective well-being that brought together data producers, policy professionals, and leading academics, to share their expertise on the best ways to measure subjective well-being, and the latest developments in using the data to improve policy-making. This workshop was an opportunity to take stock of recent developments, strengthen the network of practitioners that already exists in Asia-Pacific, and build a deeper understanding of subjective well-being for both data producers and data users.

The High-Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress (HLEG) held a thematic workshop on the Measurement of Well-Being and Development in Africa. This event, organised by the Government of South Africa, the Initiative for Policy Dialogue (Columbia University), the Center on Global Economic Governance (Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs), the Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management (Cornell University), and the Atkinson Center for a Sustainable Future (Cornell University), brought together the best thinking and practice in going beyond GDP in the measurement of well-being and development in Africa.

The High-Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress (HLEG) held a thematic workshop on Measuring Inequalities of Income and Wealth. This event, organised in collaboration with Bertelsmann Stiftung, brought together members of the HLEG subgroup on Income and Wealth Inequality and other international experts in inequalities to develop concrete recommendations and help move the income and wealth inequality measurement agenda forward.

Over the last decade significant progress has been made in the measurement of people’s well-being, however, for these measures to have a significant impact on the design and development of specific policies, we must go beyond simply measuring well-being outcomes. It is important to know, not just the current level and distribution of well-being, but also what drives well-being, and whether the same causal mechanisms apply at different stages of the life course. Subjective well-being is a key area where better information on causality is needed. The OECD, the Centre for Economic Performance of the London School of Economics and the CEPREMAP Well-Being Observatory jointly organised a workshop on modelling the causes of subjective well-being over the life course of individuals. The workshop brought together a range of researchers estimating models of the life course determinants of current subjective well-being based on longitudinal data for a number of countries. The objective of the workshop was to present some initial findings from current research in this area and help define the agenda for the future.

The High-Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress (HLEG) held a thematic workshop on Inequality of Opportunity. This event, organised in collaboration with the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, brought together members of the HLEG subgroup on Multidimensional and Global Inequalities and other international experts in inequalities to develop concrete recommendations and help move the multidimensional and global inequalities agenda forward.

The jobs people hold are an important determinant of their well-being as most people spend a substantial part of their time at work and work for a significant part of their life. Beyond its direct impact on individual well-being, job quality affects labour force participation, workers' commitment and firms' productivity, and thus also has an impact on the labour market and on economic performance. Yet, despite the importance of job quality, much of the international policy debate has focused on quantitative outcomes and neglected the qualitative dimensions of work. The aim of this technical seminar was to bring job quality to the forefront of the policy debate by presenting recent and on-going work by the OECD on job quality and sharing expertise with leading academics and key stakeholders in this field. It included a comparative perspective on frameworks developed by the OECD, other international organisations and academics through themed sessions that addressed the key conceptual and measurement aspects of job quality, such as earnings, labour-market security and the quality of the work environment. The seminar also layed out the directions for future research and measurement development in this field.

The objective of this forum, organised by the Government of the State of Jalisco and co-sponsored by the OECD, was to launch a platform to enable discussion and the development of a work agenda on well-being, quality of life and development policies with the aim of encouraging Latin American governments, especially at the sub-national level, to include this approach in their policies and planning. With a sub national governmental level perspective, the discussion assesed to what extent issues related to well-being, quality of life, happiness and development have an effect in governmental public policy formulation in Latin American Region.

The OECD and the Humanistic Management Network jointly organised a conference on well-being and business. One of the objectives of the conference was to examine whether the well-being of stakeholders can become an alternative business purpose; one that legitimises business activity within society and with other stakeholders, including investors. Such a focus would represent a paradigm shift in how we think about the purpose of business. Serving the common good requires that firms ensure they can balance a multitude of stakeholders, not only in financial terms but also in psychological, social and environmental terms. Opportunities and the potential of business to deliver on well-being at the societal, organisational and individual levels were explored. These opportunities may positively affect the sustainability of business models and allow firms to grow and prosper faster and longer over time.

The High-Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress (HLEG) held a thematic workshop on Multidimensional Subjective Well-Being. This event, organised in collaboration with the Herbert Simon Society and the Collegio Carlo Alberto, brought together members of the HLEG subgroup on subjective well-being, other international experts in subjective well-being, as well as several local well-being experts to develop concrete recommendations and help move the subjective well-being agenda forward.

The European Social Survey (ESS) is a biennial social survey charting stability and change of Europeans’ social attitudes and behaviours. During the seminar, findings from the Personal and Social Well-Being module (rounds 3 and 6) used in the most recent wave of the ESS were presented. This module contributes significantly to filling some of the key knowledge gaps identified by the Stiglitz-Sen-Fitoussi report. In particular, the module addresses key information gaps relating to measures of subjective well-being beyond the commonly used measures of life satisfaction. This seminar was organised as part of the ESS Policy Seminars series.

The High-Level Expert Group on the Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress (HLEG) held its first thematic workshop on Sustainability that addressed “Intra-generational and Inter-generational Sustainability”. This workshop was organised in conjunction with the 2nd IEA-ISI Strategic Forum, sponsored by SAS, and hosted by the Einaudi Institute for Economics and Finance and the Bank of Italy. The IEA-ISI Strategic Forum it a joint initiative of the International Economic Association (IEA) and the International Statistical Institute (ISI) who have decided to promote the development of new measurement and analytical frameworks and tools for “equitable and sustainable well-being”. This initiative brings together statisticians, economists and other experts to develop, discuss and promote new ideas on the measurement of well-being. The first Forum took place on 1-2 July 2013 and focused on “The Measurement of the Cost of Long and Deep Recessions: Beyond GDP”.

The OECD organised a workshop on subjective well-being that aimed to bring together data producers, policy professionals, and leading academics, to share their expertise on the best ways to measure subjective well-being, and the latest developments in using the data to improve policy-making. This workshop was an opportunity to take stock of recent developments, strengthen the network of practitioners that already exists in Europe, and build a deeper understanding of subjective well-being for both data producers and data users.

The OECD participated with the National Statistics Office of Mexico (INEGI) and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) in the organisation of an international conference on measuring governance, crime and justice systems. Conclusions from this conference will feed into several important fora, including the United Nations Statistical Commission, the UN Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice, the Post-2015 Development Agenda and the 5th OECD World Forum on "Statistics, Knowledge and Policy".

The European Social Survey (ESS) is a biennial social survey charting stability and change of Europeans’ social attitudes and behaviours. Round 6 of the ESS, which was fielded in 29 European countries in 2012, included a dedicated module on Europeans’ understandings and evaluations of democracy. During the seminar, the ESS ERIC Director provided an overview of the ESS followed by consideration of the methodological issues that arose when developing the module. Preliminary findings from 23 countries were then presented by members of the question module design team. This seminar was organised as part of the ESS Policy Seminars series. Click here for the agenda and presentations.

>>14 Jan. 2014

Workshop on "Alternative indicators to GDP: to do what?", OECD Headquarters, Paris, France

This workshop was organised by the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI), an independent policy institute based in Paris and gathered Martine Durand, Director of the OECD Statistics Directorate, Florence Jany-Catrice, Economist and Professor at Lille University and Eloi Laurent, Economist at the OFCE and Professor at Sciences Po Paris.

During the Europe 2020 Steering Committee, and in close co-operation with the European Economic and Social Committee, the OECD participated in a hearing on "Measuring societal progress - challenges for Europe" and presented the main findings of the How's Life? report. The meeting gathered representatives from the Economic and Social Committee in the EU as well as researchers and representatives from civil society.

The OECD launched the 2013 edition of itsHow's Life? report at the European Press Club in Brussels.

>> 8 Sept. 2013

Workshop on subjective well-being – Measurement and policy use, Columbia University, New York, United States

Following the launch of the OECD Guidelines on Measuring Subjective Well-being, the first set of international guidelines on measuring subjective well-being, the OECD organised a workshop on subjective well-being. This one-day workshop brought together policy-makers, data producers, world-renowned academics, and OECD experts to discuss the measurement of subjective well-being and hear about their experiences in using subjective well-being measurement to improve decision making. This workshop was the first of a series of three OECD workshops on measuring subjective well-being taking place, respectively in the Americas, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region. It was held in conjunction with the launch of the second edition of the "World Happiness Report".

This was the third international conference of economists interested in welfare economics and public policy broadly defined. This conference followd those organised in Oxford (July 2009) and Paris (July 2011). The conference was informed by the work done over the past decade by economists, statisticians and social analysts to develop broad measures of well-being, and touched on some of the well-being dimensions included in the OECD's work in this area. The conference included three major strands: policy and empirical economics; economic theory; and econometrics.

>> 24 May 2013

Seminar on Social Inequalities and Mortality, OECD Headquarters, Paris, France

Johan Mackenbach described socio-economic inequalities in mortality and self-assessed health observed at the country level in both North America and Europe, while shedding light on the contribution of specific risk factors.

This seminar, jointly organised by the OECD and the European Social Survey, presented findings from the European Social Survey and gathered some of the most prominent researchers working on the relationship between the quality of work and quality of life.

The objective of the conference, co-organised by the International Association for Research in Income and Wealth (IARIW) and the OECD, was to deepen the understanding of economic insecurity from both a theoretical and empirical perspective.

This conference, co-organised by France and the OECD, aimed to deepen on-going reflection on responses and policy implications, following the recommendations of the Stiglitz-Sen-Fitoussi Commission. On this occasion, the OECD launched the first edition of itsHow's Life? report.

This event, co-organised by The Open University, Oxford University, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and the OECD, gathered researchers and academics working in welfare economics. It aimed to deepen the dialogue between policy-makers and the academic community, and to engage the latter in a discussion on policies to improve people's well-being.